TSZ
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WARNING - HARD WORK AHEAD
(not for the faint of heart, or folks who are not familiar with Linux or the working end of a soldering iron)
So first of all a little bit of history
Some folks have an awesome device, a Logitech Squeezebox. Now that thing is old, even by today's standards. The software is flaky, the device even more so.
The unit I have here just refuses to work, and I've spent days trying- it probably has something to do with IPv6 or a lack of support for DNS lookups and how they are done now.
It stopped working in 2016 or thereabouts, and won't work on FTTH connections at all. Logitech discontinued it long ago, and there's no support.
To cut a long story short, the desktop server software cannot see Logitech's servers 9 times out of 10, and the device itself cannot see the desktop server even via LAN or Wireless...
So in short, there's a networking issue in the device that cannot be resolved.
Here is what the unit looks like...
Now if we look inside the receiver unit.. oh my gosh, that's OLD SHIT...
So basically they have a very old Ubicom CPU (that company no longer exists) and the SoC is designed for ADSL routers as I found out, and then, as things were done in 2003, a Wi-Fi module is plugged in on the PCI bus.
Old flash memory, old SDRAM, and a CPLD (Xilinx chip) to tie everything together, plus a REALTEK CODEC IC.
But but but S2K, you CAN build a Linux kernel for this!!!
Er no I can't, because, compiling U-BOOT for this ancient chip is not possible. Its not supported, so there's no real way of getting Linux on there and there's no toolchains for that ancient device.
The last bit of info on a toolchain dates 2006 and the chip has been discontinued for over a decade, so no chance!
Solution- Design a new Device
Now, since I am very familiar with Quad core ARM Cortex CPUs, it has occurred to me that I could probably compile Linux for one of those chips and make something like this
and yes, this is exactly what I am going to do- I am going to build a Squeezebox similar to this, except I will do the following differently.
- That remote control, while it is nice and all, is a power hog, and also very expensive to make. I don't need a remote control with a screen.
I will likely drop the fricking thing and then create new swearwords because I dropped it.
- Like other models predating this one, I'd rather put the display in the receiver, and use that to display the details of what I am listening to, and use a simple remote to
control it. And because I listen to music of various origins, the one important aspect is that whatever display is used, it can handle JIS text (Japanese).
This may or may not be an issue, I think to avoid having to maintain a massive 2000+ character embedded font, and being able to use a regular character VFD (the graphics VFDs are pricey)
I will opt to just rename affected tracks to romaji <- SUBJECT TO CHANGE
- And to appease the audiophiles who constantly take a stab at me and declare that my audio designs are shit,
you can plug in an external soundcard like the ASUS XONAR and bypass the internal audio chain completely and then STFU!
So now you have the basic jist, let's get on with it. The next updates to the thread will contain progress made on the project.
(not for the faint of heart, or folks who are not familiar with Linux or the working end of a soldering iron)
So first of all a little bit of history
Some folks have an awesome device, a Logitech Squeezebox. Now that thing is old, even by today's standards. The software is flaky, the device even more so.
The unit I have here just refuses to work, and I've spent days trying- it probably has something to do with IPv6 or a lack of support for DNS lookups and how they are done now.
It stopped working in 2016 or thereabouts, and won't work on FTTH connections at all. Logitech discontinued it long ago, and there's no support.
To cut a long story short, the desktop server software cannot see Logitech's servers 9 times out of 10, and the device itself cannot see the desktop server even via LAN or Wireless...
So in short, there's a networking issue in the device that cannot be resolved.
Here is what the unit looks like...
Now if we look inside the receiver unit.. oh my gosh, that's OLD SHIT...
So basically they have a very old Ubicom CPU (that company no longer exists) and the SoC is designed for ADSL routers as I found out, and then, as things were done in 2003, a Wi-Fi module is plugged in on the PCI bus.
Old flash memory, old SDRAM, and a CPLD (Xilinx chip) to tie everything together, plus a REALTEK CODEC IC.
But but but S2K, you CAN build a Linux kernel for this!!!
Er no I can't, because, compiling U-BOOT for this ancient chip is not possible. Its not supported, so there's no real way of getting Linux on there and there's no toolchains for that ancient device.
The last bit of info on a toolchain dates 2006 and the chip has been discontinued for over a decade, so no chance!
Solution- Design a new Device
Now, since I am very familiar with Quad core ARM Cortex CPUs, it has occurred to me that I could probably compile Linux for one of those chips and make something like this
and yes, this is exactly what I am going to do- I am going to build a Squeezebox similar to this, except I will do the following differently.
- That remote control, while it is nice and all, is a power hog, and also very expensive to make. I don't need a remote control with a screen.
I will likely drop the fricking thing and then create new swearwords because I dropped it.
- Like other models predating this one, I'd rather put the display in the receiver, and use that to display the details of what I am listening to, and use a simple remote to
control it. And because I listen to music of various origins, the one important aspect is that whatever display is used, it can handle JIS text (Japanese).
This may or may not be an issue, I think to avoid having to maintain a massive 2000+ character embedded font, and being able to use a regular character VFD (the graphics VFDs are pricey)
I will opt to just rename affected tracks to romaji <- SUBJECT TO CHANGE
- And to appease the audiophiles who constantly take a stab at me and declare that my audio designs are shit,
you can plug in an external soundcard like the ASUS XONAR and bypass the internal audio chain completely and then STFU!
So now you have the basic jist, let's get on with it. The next updates to the thread will contain progress made on the project.